Thursday, September 29, 2005

one's body shouldn't generate THIS much mucous (9-29-05)

Yes, I am a delinquent. I didn’t send out an email last week and I am late sending this one out. Well, I have had house guests (Hi Annie and Dabney) and now I have a sinus infection. Those are my excuses. So there.

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TIME WASTER #1
1. You may want to grab a calculator
2. Key in the first three digits of your phone number (NOT the area code)
3. Multiply by 80
4. Add 1
5. Multiply by 250
6. Add the last 4 digits of your phone number
7. Add the last 4 digits of your phone number again.
8. Subtract 250
9. Divide number by 2

... the outcome should be your phone number ...

Thanks to Beverly Barnes!

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I was the maid of honor at my friend Sandy’s wedding to George and here are some words of advice for any maid or matron of honor:
- Bring lots of Valium and/or Ativan.

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As previously mentioned, Annie and Dabney were in town with Annie’s two aunts and one uncle. The relatives took the Gray Line’s All Loop Tour which included a night tour on their double decker bus. One night, when the relatives were at Lion King, Annie, Dabney and I went on the night tour. The night tour went through Times Square, into Chelsea, around Greenwich Village, through Chinatown, over the Manhattan Bridge, through Brooklyn Heights to see the Manhattan skyline at night, back over the Manhattan Bridge, through Chinatown, and back to Times Square.
First, I have to say that as a New Yorker, there is nothing like sitting on a bus at night and looking into the second floors of apartment buildings that you have never seen or would ever have a chance to see. There are some dumps, but there are also some fantastic apartments with people who must be sick and tired of seeing tourists staring into their apartments all week long.
Second, the highlight of the tour for me was crossing the bridge. The bus has no shocks (I felt like I was getting whiplash through the tour) and the double decker bus was filled with people on top and nobody but the driver underneath. So, needless to say, the bus didn’t feel very stable. And while you are sitting on the top shelf, you can actually see over the bridge barriers and into the water. And because of the height, you can actually see the cables holding up the bridge - very close up. So, while you cross the bridge, the bus is swaying and the water is shimmering underneath. Very scary.
Third, tourists are nice, clueless people. Unfortunately, the tour guide was an acerbic, bitter evil woman. She had her iPod in one ear the entire trip, even while she was giving her tour speeches. However, everyone else on the bus was quite nice.
Overall, it was an interesting trip. It made me realize how hard it is to be a tourist in New York.

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My friend Sun Ae sent me these amazing web sites:
http://www.danielhsia.com/m_squat.php
http://www.connectkorea.com/menu/videowatch.php?number=37&page=8 I recommend watching this on IE or a PC. When I tried to watch it on a Mac, the video stopped halfway through. Unfortunately, the REAL action starts to cook at the end.

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Listening to the news lately makes me think that we have been time warped into a past century. For example, didn’t we already have a debate about evolution vs. creationism (now spun as “intelligent design”)? Wasn’t it decided that we should keep religion outside of schools? What happened? Why are we discussing this again? Also, didn’t we decide that abortions are legal? Why are we STILL debating this issue? I know I don’t pay attention to anything, especially people talking, but I KNOW that we had these debates years ago. I wasn’t there per se, but I know I read about them somewhere.

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This week’s horoscopes go out to:
Bob and Russell
Michelle Ertischek
Annie and Dabney
The Marthas
Lisa Davidson
Google

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Fall has won. I finally wore shoes this week. My feet are very sad to be cooped up inside of a shoe. They were so happy, free in a pair of sandals.

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Check out your horoscopes at www.freewillastrology.com/horoscopes/printer-friendly.html
Free Will Astrology
Horoscopes for week of September 29, 2005
By Rob Brezsny
© 1995-2004, Rob Brezsny. All rights reserved.

my freezer

Friday, September 16, 2005

This is for my freaky cat loving friends (Thanks Ashbloem!):
http://www.7secondsoflove.com/ninja/
And one more for you cat loving freaks, http://stuffonmycat.com/

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So, I haven’t written in several weeks. My apologies.
Michelle

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Through my friends Carey and Steven (hey!) I volunteered for the second (officially, third unofficially) time at BBQ NYC (http://www.bbq-nyc.com/) as a food commando (I had to oversee the moving on the food line and the bringing of the meat) and also entered the salsa contest. I entered using someone else’s recipe (Ron Johnson’s to be exact) and, to the big chagrin of my foodie friends (yes, my dirty little secret is out: I am a closet foodie, who posts on food web sites. I like good food. Preferably cheap good food), I used CANNED tomatoes and GARLIC SALT. My foodie friends used heirloom tomatoes and totally organic ingredients. The rest of the items I used were organic, except for the CANNED TOMATOES and GARLIC SALT. Oh, and the pre-chopped, bottled garlic. Yes, that’s right. PRE CHOPPED, BOTTLED GARLIC.
Well, long story short, I won the salsa contest. The big prize was a t-shirt.
Here’s the recipe:
Place in food processor:
One can San Marzanos
Two jalapenos, stems removed
two cloves of garlic
half red onion, roughly chopped
bunch of cilantro, stems removed
juice of two limes (I added this right before serving instead of letting it sit for 24 hours)
salt
pepper
chopped scallions
habanero to taste

Process to desired chunkiness, place in covered container in fridge for 24 hours.
THANKS RON JOHNSON!

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Last week I was in LA for my friend Sandy’s wedding to George. I was the maid of honor. Photos available on http://girlladyfriend.blogspot.com/ Will tell you ALL about that next week.

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This week’s horoscopes go out to:
Sandy and George
Young Mee, Laurie, Claire, Sofia, Linda
Bev and her George
Carey and Steven
The Mighty Fine BBQ NYC crew
Big Island BBQ
Adam Perry Lang (of Daisy Mae fame) for some fine pig Bob and Russell Saumya and her wonderful sister and brother in law Mija and Kevin plus one!
Bye Martha!

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Check out your weekly horoscope at http://www.freewillastrology.com/horoscopes/printer-friendly.html
Free Will Astrology
Horoscopes for week of September 15, 2005
By Rob Brezsny
© 1995-2004, Rob Brezsny. All rights reserved.

Monday, September 12, 2005

Sandy's wedding

My friend Sandy's wedding. Guess which one I am. Yep, that's me in the brown dress.